


celui qui laissés derrière

by JamOnToast



Category: Criminal Minds (US TV)
Genre: Angst, Break Up, Emily in Paris, F/F, F/M, Other, gender neutral reader, hints of jemily
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-30
Updated: 2020-08-30
Packaged: 2021-03-12 08:47:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,755
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29882037
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JamOnToast/pseuds/JamOnToast
Summary: She never meant to forge a life in Paris. But seven months in, it’s time for her to leave behind much more than she arrived with.
Relationships: Emily Prentiss/Reader, Jennifer "JJ" Jareau/Emily Prentiss
Kudos: 3





	celui qui laissés derrière

**Author's Note:**

> also posted on my tumblr (pumpkin-stars)  
> this was written as part of tumblr user veraiconcos' 3k follower challenge. it won 1st place!

It’s been seven months since Doyle. Since the searing pain in her abdomen, Morgan crying into her shoulder, yelling for help. The ride in the ambulance, dropping in and out of consciousness, the white interior hazy through concussion and blood loss. The operating table. Those few minutes where she  _ was _ dead. The empty blackness stretching out in every direction… Seven months of night terrors and caffeine fuelled hours spent looking at the stars, finding the little spots littering the black, a false assurance that  _ yes, there’s something out there at the end of it all. _

It’s been seven months since she said goodbye to the only people she’d let herself care about since her childhood. Left them behind with no idea when -  _ if _ \- she could return. Seven months since she started playing online scrabble with ch33tobre4th, laying words like  _ settled, safe,  _ and _ coping _ . Her opponent’s words:  _ different, quiet,  _ and _ missing _ .

Emily lies in bed, silk sheet lazily draped over her as she stares at the ceiling, unsure whether to laugh or cry.

The last game she played… just the previous afternoon… the carefully placed  _ travel, homeward,  _ and _ tomorrow _ … Today.

She should be happy. She should be packing everything into the two small suitcases she’d brought with her. She should be excited about returning to her friends - her family. But-

(There’s always a but, isn’t there?)

A groan at her side, the dragging of the sheet as the body beside her wakes and stretches. Her head turns, watching you in the early light of the Parisian morning, the room bathed in light gold hues, open curtains billowing in the breeze from the gap in the balcony doors, everything painted in warmth and calm. A contrast to the thoughts playing on your minds.

The sky is blue.

It’s always some shade of blue or grey, but today it’s almost mockingly perfect. That bright, cloudless, perfect blue… the blue that everyone dreams of seeing because it signifies a sunny day. It means more people are in a good mood because the rain hasn’t ruined their morning, it means warmth and light instead of that dull cold that settles into your bones and makes you dream of better days. The cold that cuts you to the core and makes you think you’ll never be warm again.

As she watches you wake, she knows… She’ll be the one to ruin that  _ perfect blue _ for you forever. Despite the colours, today is one of those cold, cloudy days.

You shift at her side, legs twisted in the sheet. She lets out a slow, heavy breath, wishing she could pause this moment of bliss. Wishing she could remember it for the rest of time…

It’s six months, give or take, since you came along. Six months of someone else at her side, watching the stars, fuelling the coffee pot at  _ too early _ o’clock, snuffing the flames of loneliness and fear, carefully nurturing the spark of contentment, watching it grow together, the dangerous, burning waves of passion and love…

Quashed to embers.

She knows you’re awake. And you know she knows. But you’re both content to lie there, pretending that you’re not… Emily watching you, you watching the inside of your eyelids. You both know that opening your eyes makes it real. That morning has arrived. That the soft sunlight will burn you both to ash, leaving you with only the harsh reminders of reality. The burning of your almost-love (because it’s not there yet, but give it another week and it could _would_ have been…) reducing you to blackened husks, leaving charcoal footprints travelling away from each other… one set with a destination, the other - without her - wandering aimlessly… the way she wandered before you came to hold her hand.

And so you lie there, the both of you, suspended in that moment of non-time, at the tipping point of your life together… precariously balanced on the swaying scales of peace and destruction.

Waiting.

It’s the quiet chirruping of your cat, Alfonso, which finally tips the scales just one measurement too far. He’s smart, for a cat, naturally in tune with you and your emotions. His trust in her is what endeared you to Emily when you met. He’d always been wary, but that first night she’d come round - after one too many drinks and far too many tears in the grimy bathroom of the bar you worked at - Alfonso had rubbed around her ankles, vibrating like the engine of her motorbike as he purred, trusting her implicitly on sight.

When she woke on your sofa the next morning to find him curled against her chest, glass of water on the coffee table, she’d let herself slip. She’d let herself start to care about something other than hiding, allowed herself just one moment to think of a future in Paris instead of dreaming of a life at home…

Now, in the bright light of day, that dream is about to come true. The quiet Parisian future only an alternate reality, your parallel selves diving headfirst into a future together… you and Emily parting ways. She no longer needed you to feel whole. She had someone else waiting for her on the other side, and she was going  _ home _ , leaving you and Alfonso with nobody else…

He jumped onto the bed beside you, nuzzling against your cheek, giving you no choice but to open your eyes, squinting against the light, one hand moving to greet him with a scratch behind the ears, earning another chirrup and a waft of fish-breath as he meowed a good morning, urging you to get up and fill his (likely half-full) dish.

Emily watches as you turn, rolling to lie on your back, the both of you side by side, staring upwards, your hands brushing against each other, but the two of you just so far away. Lying together yet so far apart.

A whole ocean away next to each other.

It’s silent then. Alfonso realises he’s interrupted something and jumps off the mattress, trotting across the open room to wait by his dish, his back to you in some weird offering of privacy.

You don’t move. You’re awake, it’s morning… it’s  _ today _ and you can’t avoid it no matter how much you want to… But if you don’t get up, if you don’t watch the clock on the wall steadily ticking… second after second after second, if you don’t let the day continue… maybe it won’t.

You’re making every futile effort to stay with her. And then she turns to you.

“I’m sorry.”

And she is. You know it. Deep in your heart, you know. She’s sorry she has to leave. She’s sorry that she’s leaving someone behind again… Sorry she ever connected with someone enough to need to say it.

You don’t reply. You can’t.

You shed your tears yesterday, falling asleep beside her, wrapped around her in an effort to lock yourselves together permanently. In your sleep, you’d shifted to the other side of the bed in some subconscious admission of defeat, some reluctant release of your life together.

But now you don’t want her to go.

But there’s nothing you can do.

She sighs, rolling to face you, eyes raking over you, taking you in for what’s probably the final time.

Her eyes are sad. They have been for the majority of your time together, for reasons that were vague for the first three months until she explained what brought her to Paris. But now you see that she’s sad because of  _ you _ , not her past (and what is also now her future).

She leans in, pressing her lips to yours, a bittersweet good morning.  _ Goodbye _ .

She needs to shower before her flight, needs to pack up her memories of your short life together, to decide how much of you she wants to keep. So she slips from the warmth of the bed reluctantly, naked form heading to the bathroom, more vulnerable than she’s been for some time, ugly scar on her back and her front the last thing on her mind. You’ve seen it countless times now, it’s still horrific, and she’s adamant she’ll never wear bikinis again, but it’s a part of her, and that makes it beautiful…

Every single inch of her is beautiful, and as you watch her walk away, you wonder:

**“If I asked you to stay, would you?”**

She stops, one hand on the door frame, head dropping as she hears the crack in your voice.

It’s when she leaves the room without a word - without so much as a glance - that you know the answer. She’s leaving no matter what.

And you’ll be left behind.

You know, once she’s gone, that’s it. The time you’ve spent together will get locked away in her mind, never again mentioned. A Pandora’s Box full of happiness, tainted by the fact that you’ll never see her again. You’ll never spend another evening lying on the couch, her head on your chest, talking about everything and nothing. No more mid-afternoon walks in the park, weekends at the Louvre, taking polaroids of each other mimicking the painted poses.

Emily, with all her darkness and secrets, brought a light and a truth to your life.

A light blown out as easily as an unprotected candle by a strong breeze.

A truth… the two of you bearing your souls to one another, knowing everything there was to know about the other in such a short space of time. It’s… well, you can’t help but laugh (it’s better than crying), it’s a whirlwind romance. It’s a summer affair.

She’s  _ an American in Paris _ , but unlike the Gene Kelly movie, you know nobody’s going to change their mind about running away with her, turn the car around, and bring Emily back to you to the cheers of your imaginary audience.

Maybe, if Emily is Lise, you’re not the Jerry she’s found for herself, but the Henri giving her back to him… You’ve given yourself some importance in helping her through a tough time, and now things have settled… now she’s got the choice… she’s turning from you, and into the arms of the people (the  _ person _ ) she truly loves.

You’ll miss her like hell, but as you listen to the shower turn on you can’t help but realise that, in the grand scheme of things, in the whole course of your life… you’re just a pair of footprints on Emily’s beach.

The tide’s coming in.

And that’s… that’s okay.

If it means she’s happy, then it's okay.


End file.
